Woods Elementary is on the tail end of a $4.1 million upgrade that includes five new classrooms for a total of 28, improved lanes for drop-off and pickup, renovations to its entry and a media center. The work began a year ago as $8 million worth of renovations to neighboring Chaffin Junior High School were completed.

“We have a new entrance on the school,” said Alan Love, Fort Smith schools’ director of buildings and grounds. “It’s not near as impressive or imposing as Chaffin because it’s a smaller school, but it has a new entrance and new administrative area.”

Love expects work at Woods to finish this month. “They’ve got some more cleaning up to do, and some plants and shrubs,” he said. “But the inside part is 95 percent complete. It’s ready for the most part.”

The five additional classrooms will increase the building’s square footage from 54,000 to 70,000.

Northside High School is in the midst of a $3.9 million project that will add a second floor to the fine arts facility and renovate the first. Work is expected to be finished before school begins Aug. 18.

“It’s going to be right down to the wire on that job,” Love said. “But we knew that going in.”

The project, funded by bonds, calls for adding nearly 15,000 square feet and renovating more than 10,000 square feet. The fine arts building was added to the campus during the 1980-81 school year, according to the school district.

Construction is also underway at Darby Junior High School.

“We’re building a band room where we can get all the students in,” Gooden said. “Then we’re also building some formal space for dressing facilities for the gymnasium. That’s going to be well up in the spring before it’s finished.”